The present invention relates to a discrimination system for discriminating a good or bad visibility area around a vehicle surrounding.
As disclosed in Japanese Patent Provisional Publication No. 11-220726, an attempt has been made to develop a vehicle surrounding monitor system which provides a display of image of right and left areas ahead of a vehicle over a monitor mounted in a vehicle compartment in response to an operating signal delivered from a turn signal switch and an obstacle detection signal delivered from a corner sensor which detects an obstacle present in the right and left areas ahead of the vehicle.
However, since the vehicle surrounding monitoring system of the related art is arranged such that image of the vehicle surrounding is automatically displayed over a monitor merely in response to the activating signals delivered from the turn signal switch and the corner sensor without discriminating the good or bad visibility area around the vehicle surrounding, the vehicle surrounding system encounters an issue wherein surrounding image is inevitably displayed over the monitor at all times even in the presence of a good visibility area that does not require the display of surrounding image.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a vehicle surrounding circumstance discriminating system, a vehicle surrounding monitoring system and a vehicle obstacle monitoring system and related methods by which the above issues are addressed.
According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a vehicle surrounding circumstance discriminating system for a vehicle, comprising: a vehicle speed detection unit detecting a vehicle speed; an action detecting unit detecting a driver""s action; and a surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminating a good or bad visibility area around a vehicle surrounding on the basis of the vehicle speed and the driver""s action.
According to a second aspect of the present invention, there is provided a vehicle surrounding monitoring system for a vehicle, comprising: a vehicle surrounding circumstance discriminating system including a vehicle speed detection unit detecting a vehicle speed, an action detecting unit detecting a driver""s action, and a surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminating a good or bad visibility area around a vehicle surrounding on the basis of the vehicle speed and the driver""s action, wherein said surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminates that a vehicle travels across a poor visibility area upon detection of the vehicle speed decreasing below a given value and upon detection of the driver""s action being aligned with a given action; an image taking up unit taking up image of the vehicle surrounding in a dead angle of a driver; a display unit providing a display of image of the vehicle surrounding taken up with said image taking up unit; and a control unit operative to cause said display unit to provide the display of image taken up with said image taking up unit when said surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminates that the vehicle travels across the poor visibility area.
According to a third aspect of the present invention, there is provided a vehicle surrounding monitoring system for a vehicle, comprising: a vehicle surrounding circumstance discriminating system including a vehicle speed detection unit detecting a vehicle speed, an action detecting unit detecting a driver""s action, and a surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminating a good or bad visibility area around a vehicle surrounding on the basis of the vehicle speed and the driver""s action, wherein said surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminates that a vehicle travels across a poor visibility area upon detection of the vehicle speed decreasing below a given value and upon detection of the driver""s action being aligned with a given action; an image taking up unit taking up image of the vehicle surrounding in a dead angle of a driver; a display unit providing a display of image of the vehicle surrounding taken up with said image taking up unit; a current vehicle position detecting unit detecting a current vehicle position; a memory unit storing a particular location of the poor visibility area detected with said current vehicle position detection unit when said surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminates that the vehicle travels across the poor visibility area; and a control unit operative to cause said image taking up unit to take up image and to cause the display unit to provide the display of image in response to the vehicle arriving at the particular location stored in said memory unit.
According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a vehicle obstacle warning system, comprising: a vehicle surrounding circumstance discriminating system including a vehicle speed detection unit detecting a vehicle speed, an action detecting unit detecting a driver""s action, and a surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminating a good or bad visibility area around a vehicle surrounding on the basis of the vehicle speed and the driver""s action, wherein said surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminates that a vehicle travels across a poor visibility area upon detection of the vehicle speed decreasing below a given value and upon detection of the driver""s action being aligned with a given action; an obstacle detecting unit detecting an obstacle present around the vehicle surrounding; a warning unit issuing a warning signal upon detection of said obstacle; and a control unit operative to cause said obstacle detecting unit to detect said obstacle and to cause said warning unit to issue said warning signal when said surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminates that the vehicle travels across the poor visibility area.
According to a fifth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a vehicle surrounding circumstance discriminating system for a vehicle, comprising: means for detecting a vehicle speed; means for detecting a driver""s action; and means for discriminating a good or bad visibility area around a vehicle surrounding on the basis of the vehicle speed and the driver""s action.
According to a sixth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a vehicle surrounding monitoring system for a vehicle, comprising: a vehicle surrounding circumstance discriminating unit including means for detecting a vehicle speed, means for detecting a driver""s action, and means for discriminating a good or bad visibility area around a vehicle surrounding on the basis of the vehicle speed and the driver""s action, wherein said surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminates that a vehicle travels across a poor visibility area upon detection of the vehicle speed decreasing below a given value and upon detection of the driver""s action being aligned with a given action; means for taking up image of the vehicle surrounding in a dead angle of a driver; display means for providing a display of image of the vehicle surrounding taken up with said image taking up unit; and control means operative to cause said display means to provide the display of image taken up with said image taking up means when said surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminates that the vehicle travels across the poor visibility area.
According to a seventh aspect of the present invention, there is provided a vehicle surrounding monitoring system for a vehicle, comprising: a vehicle surrounding circumstance discriminating unit including means for detecting a vehicle speed, means for detecting a driver""s action, and means for discriminating a good or bad visibility area around a vehicle surrounding on the basis of the vehicle speed and the driver""s action, wherein said surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminates that a vehicle travels across a poor visibility area upon detection of the vehicle speed decreasing below a given value and upon detection of the driver""s action being aligned with a given action; means for taking up image of the vehicle surrounding in a dead angle of a driver; display means for providing a display of image of the vehicle surrounding taken up with said image taking up means; means for detecting a current vehicle position; means for storing a particular location of the poor visibility area detected with said current vehicle position detection means when said surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminates that the vehicle travels across the poor visibility area; and control means operative to cause said image taking up means to take up image and to cause the display means to provide the display of image in response to the vehicle arriving at the particular location stored in said memory means.
According to an eighth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a vehicle obstacle warning system, comprising: a vehicle surrounding circumstance discriminating unit including means for detecting a vehicle speed, means for detecting a driver""s action, and means for discriminating a good or bad visibility area around a vehicle surrounding on the basis of the vehicle speed and the driver""s action, wherein said surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminates that a vehicle travels across a poor visibility area upon detection of the vehicle speed decreasing below a given value and upon detection of the driver""s action being aligned with a given action; means for detecting an obstacle present around the vehicle surrounding; means for issuing a warning signal upon detection of said obstacle; and control means operative to cause said obstacle detecting means to detect said obstacle and to cause said warning signal issuing means to issue said warning signal when said surrounding circumstance discriminating unit discriminates that the vehicle travels across the poor visibility area.
According to a ninth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of discriminating a vehicle surrounding circumstance, comprising: detecting a vehicle speed; detecting a driver""s action; and discriminating a good or bad visibility area around a vehicle surrounding on the basis of the vehicle speed and the driver""s action.
According to an tenth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of monitoring a vehicle surrounding, comprising: detecting a vehicle speed; detecting a driver""s action; discriminating a good or bad visibility area around a vehicle surrounding on the basis of the vehicle speed and the driver""s action when a vehicle travels across a poor visibility area upon detection of the vehicle speed decreasing below a given value and upon detection of the driver""s action being aligned with a given action; taking up image of the vehicle surrounding in a dead angle of a driver; providing a display of image of the vehicle surrounding taken up in said image taking up step; and controlling said image taking up step to be executed and said displaying step to be initiated for the display of image taken up in said image taking up step when said discriminating step discriminates that the vehicle travels across the poor visibility area.
According to a eleventh aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of monitoring a vehicle surrounding, comprising: detecting a vehicle speed; detecting a driver""s action; discriminating a good or bad visibility area around a vehicle surrounding on the basis of the vehicle speed and the driver""s action when a vehicle travels across a poor visibility area upon detection of the vehicle speed decreasing below a given value and upon detection of the driver""s action being aligned with a given action; taking up image of the vehicle surrounding in a dead angle of a driver; providing a display of image of the vehicle surrounding taken up in said image taking up step; detecting a current vehicle position; storing a particular location of the poor visibility area detected in said current vehicle position detecting step when the vehicle travels across the poor visibility area; and controlling said image taking up step to be executed to take up image and said display providing step to be initiated to provide the display of image in response to the vehicle arriving at the stored particular location.
According to a twelfth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of warning a vehicle obstacle, comprising: detecting a vehicle speed; detecting a driver""s action; discriminating a good or bad visibility area around a vehicle surrounding on the basis of the vehicle speed and the driver""s action when a vehicle travels across a poor visibility area upon detection of the vehicle speed decreasing below a given value and upon detection of the driver""s action being aligned with a given action; detecting an obstacle present around the vehicle surrounding; issuing a warning signal upon detection of said obstacle; and controlling said obstacle detecting step to be executed to detect said obstacle and said warning signal issuing step to be initiated to issue said warning signal when said vehicle travels across the poor visibility area.